Be the Monster in Your Closet.

As a kid, Halloween was the day I used to dress up as an excuse to beg door-to-door. Kinda miss that. Apart from the snow anyway.

Later I would dress up as a matter of course, join a throng of like-minded fools, drink excessively, behave immorally and generally wild out. It's important to have those days set aside just so you don't snap one day and end up doing it all the time.

Always felt that Halloween was one of those days, but uniquely. The important thing is to get geared up as something that would otherwise scare the shit out of you.

I totally would, but on Columbus Day. Halloween is for scary shit.

Do what you want of course, but I reckon too many people miss the point of Halloween. Dress up like superheroes, playboy bunnies and historical figures. You can dress like people you admire any time, but I think it's important to set a day aside every year (more often if I had my way, but this will do) to swallow your shadow. 

Halloween means it's time to become the monster in your closet.

 

Funny thing about my costumes from childhood: I instinctively dressed up as things that scared the shit out me right from the first Halloween I can remember. I think I was maybe four years old. For some reason (or lack thereof, given the parameters of "kid logic") I entertained the delusion that the skeletal remains of deceased humans could reanimate. They would then go from house to house & steal the hands and feet of sleeping children who had not taken the precaution of making sure their own hands and feet were safely under the blankets before falling asleep. I guess I was naturally paranoid or whatever, but that isn't the point.

The first Halloween costume I remember wearing was a reanimated human skeleton. A four-year-old decides to dress up as the thing that scares him stupid at night. Hadn't even heard of Carl Jung yet.

Seriously? This freak doesn't even hold a candle to my childhood night terrors.

Later I would water it down, dressing as vampires or pirates or whatever, but I remember the purity of intention that went into the undead skeleton suit. I remember the cheap plastic mask & how it looked exactly like the thing I had in my head when I was trying to go to sleep at night. I wanted to scare the living Christ out of anybody who saw me that night, and the best way to do it was to look like the thing that scared me most.

I mean, if it worked for me, it would work on grown-ups, right?

But you don't have to be that kind of scary to pass inspection.

Generally I dress up as scary characters with whom I feel a certain kinship now.* I've gone as Frankenstein's Monster more than once and the same goes for Hunter S Thompson, and those aren't necessarily scary for the same reasons as some ghoulish thing that comes to take away vital body parts.

Witness Exhibits A & B:

Scary Monsters

Frankenstein's Monster is scary because he's a home-made superhuman gone horribly wrong, yes. He is motivated by revenge & kills people (men, women and children). He even stalks down his creator to kill him. But that's not the worst of it. The scariest thing about FM is that we are all like him in some way or another. We've all experienced rejection, all felt the urge for vengeance, all felt incomplete.

Many of us also have unanswered questions about our own existence. Seeking the answers to those questions can lead to some really disappointing answers.

And a lot of people just want revenge for being born.

An early role-model of mine.

Scary Humans

Thompson? Scary. First of all, he's scary because he's a journalist with an avowed dedication to seeking and reporting what is true (as near as he can tell).

Second, he's prone to hallucination (due to a prodigious dedication to drug consumption), which can interfere with one's perception of what is in fact true.

Third, he's an idealist (which can lead to anything from suicide to genocide).

Fourth (and perhaps most important), he's an armed ticking time-bomb of drug-fueled rage - an immediate danger to himself and others.

Rest in Peace, you weird fucker.

Spider

This year it's Transmetropolitan's Spider Jerusalem. Why is that scary? Because he lives in a virtually utopian world, but sees the underpinnings of that society as being rooted in lies & corruption. Can't help but expose the truth of this rather than merely accept a cyber-punk-ish earthly paradise. Some of the same reasons why Hunter S Thompson is scary (although Thompson had many more, and the list above is hardly comprehensive). But Spider's weapon of choice is way better.

Behold, the Bowel Disruptor.

Also, his name is "Spider." Lots of people think that's a scary name.

In conclusion, I just want to say this: You are of course free to use or abuse this - the most sacred of heathen holidays - any way you see fit. Just don't complain this Christmas when I neglect to recognize the "Reason for the Season."

Update/Correction: I forgot it was Monday today. My apologies if this messied up yer day.

*Other costumes devoid of this connection were worn because they were scary and I hadn't given sufficient time to planning (like the year I went as Courtney Love... Incidentally, I quit drinking the next day & ain't had a drop since).